Page 64 of Justice for JoElla

He tried, but he couldn’t. There was a sinking sensation inside his body, and he was suddenly very tired. But there was something important he had to do. “JoElla?” he whispered, and felt something dripping from the corner of his mouth.

“Shhhh. Don’t talk. Just keep your eyes open, babe.”

“JoElla, I love you. I want you to know that.”

He couldn’t get his eyes open far enough to see her face, but he heard her say, “I love you too, dumbass.”I need to sleep, he told himself, so he didn’t fight the urge to close his eyes, and he let himself go.

* * *

“I love you too, dumbass.”JoElla pressed as hard as she could against the wound in Brandon’s chest. There was so much blood that she couldn’t tell what was hit, but she knew it was too much if he was going to survive. “Where the hell is that ambulance?” she screamed.

“They’re on their way. I told them who it is and they’re scrambling. Jesus, JoElla, why did you go off like that by yourself?”

“Because he told me I had to.”

“That was while I was out getting him that soda, wasn’t it?” Quint asked.

“Yeah. Said he wouldn’t tell anybody else, and that I had to come alone to find the man who’d been hiding Warmuth and giving him money. I didn’t know who he was until Brandon got here. He put it together and figured out Warmuth and Margolis were brothers.”

“What? Are you serious?”

“Yeah. I’m not sure how he figured it out, but he did. He’d just told me when Lance walked in and started calling my name. And the injury I got the night of the shooting of the kid? Lance shot me. It was him?behind me. He shot me from behind and wounded my arm. He was hoping that would be enough to keep me away from law enforcement, and it was, until Roy came along. He was planning to target Roy next.”

“Yeah. I heard that part.”

“How the hell did you know where I was?”

Quint rolled his eyes. “Seriously? I knew something had taken place between the two of you when I came back to Warmuth’s room, so I started following you. I didn’t tell anybody, so nobody knew. This isexactlythe kind of scenario I was trying to avoid, and instead, I just killed the police chief of Taylorsville, Kentucky. Is he gonna make it?” he whispered and trained his gaze on Brandon.

JoElla looked down at the man whose blood was seeping between her fingers. “I don’t know, but I sure hope so.”

“Coming through!” a voice yelled and in seconds, Duck and Boomer appeared. “Holy hell. Doc! Oh my god! Boom, help me here,” Duck called back to his partner as a second EMT crew headed for Lance.

“Holy shit. Okay. Keep your hands right where they are, ma’am. Keep pressing. I’m going to start a line.” JoElla watched as they prepped Brandon’s arm and inserted the needle, then taped it down and balanced an IV bag across his belly. “Let’s get him on the board. Keep your hands right there, ma’am. Just like that. You’re riding with him. Let’s go. On my count. One, two, three.” Between the two EMTs and Quint, they lifted Brandon easily and placed the backboard on the ambulance’s gurney, all while JoElla kept applying pressure to his wound. Once they were in the rig, Boomer stayed with them in the back, but she could hear Duck call out, “Dispatch, this is Station Two, unit seven. Patient is male, approximately forty years old, gunshot wound to the chest. Heart rate is 35. BP’s ninety over fifty-five and dropping. Respiration shallow. We need critical response at the hospital waiting for us. Repeat, need critical response waiting for us at the emergency department. Copy?”

“Copy, unit seven.”

“Unit seven, this is TCH emergency department. Request received and team standing by.”

“Roger that. And TCHED? The patient is BrandonFox.”

There was a moment of silence before JoElla heard the woman respond. “Roger that, unit seven. Surgical team standing by.”

“Copy that. ETA of two minutes.” As soon as he stopped, Duck yelled toward them, “How’s he hanging?”

“Barely. We almost there?”

“Yeah. I can see the sign now. Get ready for the stop. I’m going in hot.” JoElla could’ve sworn the rig went into a skid as they screamed up to the ambulance bay at the hospital.

There was a flurry of activity and the open doors of the ambulance were filled with the faces of a surgical team. JoElla didn’t turn loose until they hit the pavement. “Ma’am? You can take your hands away. We’ve got him now.”

“But?”

“We’ve got him. He’s in good hands.” She listened as Boomer ran along beside them, apprising them of his vitals as they jetted into the building and down the corridor toward the surgical suite.

There was a presence behind her and she turned to find Quint standing there. “Is he gonna make it?” the tall Texan asked.

“I have no idea.” JoElla could barely speak as she stood there, covered in Brandon’s blood, trying to figure out what was going on.

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